Friday, November 28, 2008

They found that places where individualism is valued over the collective good also tend to be places where a lot of beer is consumed.

The researchers also found they could take a group of college students and manipulate those individualist-versus-collectivist impulses a bit, which in turn influenced how thirsty those students were for beer.

“Previous research on this had shown a correlation between individualism and impulsive buying,” said L.J. Shrum, marketing department chairman at UTSA, who with lead author and marketing Assistant Professor Yinlong Zhang conducted the study published in the Journal of Consumer Research.

“The definition of an individualist is that we act on our attitudes, we be ourselves,” Shrum said. “Whereas in collectivist societies that's more frowned upon, and you want to make sure you reflect on the good of the group.”

First, there are no rugged individualists left. No frontier. No real challenges. What you have left is the urban iconoclast, who picks a "unique" attitude because it sounds cool.

Next, of course the individualists like to drink -- they're pleasing themselves. They also like to impulse buy. This is good?

The implication of the article, as in all propaganda coming from the Crowd, is that individualism is for the hip, smart, fun (drinking is fun, repeat after me, drinking is fun) and independent, while everyone else is a stupid sheep.